Project December

Project December is a small, artful experiment in conversational AI, operated independently by developer Jason Rohrer rather than by a large platform company. Instead of a polished chat app, it gives you a bare-bones text terminal and a credit-based system: you buy a package of compute credits, then spend them spinning up "personality matrices" — structured definitions of who the AI should be, how it should speak, and what it should remember about the conversation. That design makes it part toy, part creative writing instrument, and part memorial tool.

People have used Project December for a wide range of purposes: roleplaying historical figures, prototyping fictional characters, exploring language-model behavior, and — most famously — recreating the conversational style of a loved one who has died as a form of digital remembrance. The project is transparent that these are simulations, not the person themselves, and that responses come from a language model rather than from any preserved consciousness. That honest framing is part of why the project attracted media coverage and debate around grief, digital afterlife, and the ethics of very personal AI.

The experience is deliberately minimal and non-commercial in tone. There is no app store presence, no subscription dashboard, and little hand-holding: you pay a one-time fee, receive login details by email, and interact through a web terminal. Because it is a niche independent project, availability, features, and pricing can change, and the terminal can be busy when demand is high.